The Curiosity of Chance: You gotta be gay to get it

Two words about this film: Don't go.

It was the closing film at the Boston Gay and Lesbian Film Festival last night. The closer. This is supposed to be the grand finale film. And I was so looking forward to seeing it because the regular Hollywood faire is so lost on me and I even used to work for an independent film festival, and having seen Love My Life last week I thought what the BGLFF was serving up was going to be top notch.

And I'm sitting in the dark watching this film, thinking to myself, Okay, what am I missing here? It must be a gay thing, since I'm not gay. But I like camp. I'm even partial to faux-French lampshades. I just don't get it.

It's bad TV, complete with cardboard one- dimensional characters, and horrible trite dialogue.

Set during the protagonist's high school year, it's complete with a wise-beyond-his-years hero who is so sensitive (we're assuming because he's gay and has greater insight into the world than the rest of us), a bullying, macho sports hero, and the protag's two side-kicks, a hip (but not popular) girl and a bumbling but oh-so-likable male friend. Of course those three wear outrageous but super hip clothes, while the rest of the entire cast was dressed in just the regular style of the '80's, which was pretty disgusting when you think about it. Did I mention the school administrator who spoke with an East German accent?

What were these people thinking when they chose something like this? Who knows. Of course, I guess I'm not the intended audience.